The Secret Operation Revealed Decades Later

Operation Paperclip: Hire Nazi scientists

A bloody conflict like World War II is bound to result in some government secrets, but this one is especially cringe-worthy. In August 1945, with the smoke of World War II still clearing, President Harry Truman approved the hiring of more than 1,500 German scientists, technicians, and engineers. One of them was Wernher von Braun, the chief rocket engineer of the Third Reich and Walter Schreiber, the German Army’s wartime chief of medical science who authorized dangerous experiments on humans. To assure security clearance in the United States, the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency created false records for the scientists, many of whom were considered wartime criminals.